CARRIER 2: VIPER STRIKE By Keith Douglass

“Hang on, Zig! I’m goosin’ it!” He rammed the throttles full forward,

cutting in the Tomcat’s afterburners as he stood the aircraft on its

tail. He heard Zig-Zag Ziegler grunt over the ICS as the acceleration

slammed them into their ejection seats.

“We got two splittin’ off!” Zig-Zag reported, his voice crackling over

the ICS with excitement and tension. “Two splittin’ off! They’re

coming’ after us, man!”

The Tomcat continued to climb, pursued now by a pair of Chinese-copied

MiGs, while the two remaining MiGs stayed on the deck, streaking south.

Taggart caught a glimpse of sun flashing from silver wings, of arrowing

white contrails in the humid air.

He pulled the stick over sharply, breaking out of his climb and dropping

toward the jungle. If the MiGs going after Batman got too far ahead …

“Tone!” Ziegler yelled. “Price! They got lock-on!”

He heard the warble of missile lock over his headphones. Someone was

lining him up for a radar-targeted launch.

“Keep cool, Zig,” he yelled. “They’re messing with our minds. that’s

all!”

The MiG launched an instant later.

1250 hours, 17 January

Tomcat 232

There was no time to think as the SAM clawed toward the Tomcat. Tactical

doctrine claimed that it was easy to shake a Grail’s infrared lock;

often all that was necessary was to throttle back until its electronic

concentration on the plane’s engines was broken.

The problem was they were already flying low and slow. He’d have to

goose it hard just to get enough speed for maneuver … and he was

rapidly running out of sky.

He dropped the Tomcat’s left wing, sharpening his turn. He could see

the Grail’s twisting white tail bending to follow. It was ignoring the

flares, homing unerringly on the heat from the F-14’s engines, and

Batman remembered learning that Grails were fitted with filters which

screened out decoy flares.

He had to pick up speed now.

Trading precious altitude for more speed, Batman plunged toward the

jungle canopy, watching as the rapidly sweeping hands of his altimeter

ticked off the feet. The missile followed.

1250 hours, 17 January

Tomcat 203

Taggart pulled the Tomcat into a seven-G turn, standing on the port wing

as he tried to outrace the missile. “Chaff!” he yelled. “Dump chaff!”

Packets of aluminum-coated mylar strips burst one after another from the

Tomcat’s tail, dispersing in a cloud behind and below the aircraft.

Taggart caught a glimpse of the two MiGs following him, a tight-knit

pair of specks low on the horizon. The radar-homer twisted toward him.

“Homeplate! Homeplate!” he called. “This is Two-oh-three. We have

launch. Repeat, confirm bandit launch!” Switching to the intercom

again, he added, “Arm missiles!”

“Hot and armed.”

The missile curved through the sky toward them …

1251 hours, 17 January

Tomcat 232

Batman kicked in the Tomcat’s afterburners, and six Gs molded him to the

hard frame of his ejection seat. “Keep … popping … flares …!” he

grunted against the pressure. The treetops clutched at his left

wingtip, seemingly only a few yards below as he hauled back on the

stick. He glanced back over his shoulder as he pulled out of the dive,

estimating the Grail’s angle of attack. Adrenaline surged, sharpening

every sense, every perception.

The missile flew up the F-14’s port engine.

Batman both heard and felt the explosion, a solid whump which

transmitted itself through the aircraft’s frame. His instrument panel

exploded with red warning lights. His left fuel pump was gone … trim

control … left rudder … The engine fire warning lit up and Batman

hurriedly shut down the fuel flow to the port engine and initiated a

shutdown. God! They’d been savaged!

“Malibu! You still with me?”

“I’m okay! I’m not sure the plane is!”

Smoke boiled from the Tomcat’s port engine. The left wing dropped low,

and the aircraft began shuddering as Batman struggled to bring it under

control. “Mayday! Mayday!” He could hear Malibu in the backseat

reciting the litany of an aircraft in distress. “This is Tomcat

Two-three-two declaring an emergency. We have been hit by hostile

ground fire and are going down. Mayday! Mayday …”

1251 hours, 17 January

Tomcat 203

Taggart kept the F-14 turning as the radar homer closed. The missile

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